Industry News

If you're an exhibitor planning to showcase a product or service at IMTS 2018, please click here to send a press release and image of the product or service to Cutting Tool Engineering Editor Alan Richter.

There's a new woman in my life, and my wife is jealous. Really? I admit that I've been a little preoccupied lately with automating my house, but to say that I talk to Alexa more than the mother of my children is unfair. No, it's not obsessive behavior; it's an experiment in what's possible.

One benefit of expanding manufacturing employment is that workers are paid a premium. However, there is less of a pay advantage in manufacturing than there used to be. This suggests that policies to expand manufacturing employment should be accompanied by policies that maintain or strengthen compensation standards.

February U.S. cutting tool consumption totaled $190.12 million, according to the U.S. Cutting Tool Institute and the Association for Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the Cutting Tool Market Report collaboration, was up 3.5 percent from January's $183.61 million and 8.7 percent when compared with the $174.98 million reported for February 2017. With a year-to-date total of $373.73 million, 2018 is up 7.4 percent when compared with 2017.

Diacid 1550 is a bio-based emulsifier with a growing reputation among metal working fluid formulators worldwide. Because of its ability to create a more stable metalworking fluid and provide corrosion inhibition, Diacid is a trusted addition to formulations used to machine super alloy metals. This means that customers can expect precision even in the high-heat and high-pressure environments of jet and rocket engine manufacturing. That's The Ingevity Effect.

The most fundamental elements of any metalcutting process, cutting tools are by their nature consumable. They wear until they are no longer effective. A traditional approach to metalcutting tool management employs wear analysis alone, focused on manipulating tool materials, geometries and application parameters to improve part output and tool life in a selected operation. To maximize the efficiency of your facility's entire manufacturing process – boosting part-processing productivity and impacting the bottom line – you must go further in the pursuit of optimization.

It's no secret that many manufacturers are scrambling to attract skilled workers to fill openings. A host of training programs are available to provide job seekers with the skills needed to get hired, and one in my hometown of Chicago that caught my attention is the Jane Addams Resource Center.

CNC machines rely on certain fundamentals to achieve peak performance for maximum productivity. This not only includes the machine but importantly the infrastructure of the facility, specifically ancillary services such as power, air and coolant.

Long wait times? Extra costs? Too complicated? Bruce Kyle, president of toolmaker Knight Carbide Inc. in Chesterfield, Mich., wants to dispel myths about ordering custom carbide inserts.

A good friend and I have had a running argument lately about 3D printing. He says the fervor over additive manufacturing is, for the most part, hype, something he likes to call the boondoggle of the manufacturing century. He could be right.

There are many advantages to financing your equipment purchases instead of paying cash. Stearns Bank vice president of business development, Michelle Fuchs, has helped many businesses reap the benefits of commercial equipment financing. They've learned that financing, rather than cash, is the best approach for the long-term health of their business.

United Grinding Group AG held an event in its Kuřim, Czech Republic-based Walter Maschinenbau GmbH production facility to announce its new flow assembly line. Speakers included Walter CEO Jürgen Schock and flow assembly line project manager Markus Schulze, both of whom welcomed guests and introduced the new innovation prior to pressing a symbolic start button with the entire project team to launch the new line.